How can I learn to use APA and MLA formats?

Question

I can guide you step-by-step through APA and MLA style guides.

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Answer 1

Hi! You can use lots of online resources to work through APA and MLA, but the best online guides are either Purdue Owl, which gives step-by-step examples for making both in-text and bibliographic citations, or the official websites and physical books for APA and MLA. I wouldn't recommend using one of those easy citation creators, where you input your website link and it generates a citation for you. Those citation generators usually aren't updated with the most recent format and just don't get the citations right. Every citation style uses the author's name, the title of the article, and the year, just in different locations within the citation and in different styles. The best part about manually creating citations and using examples from official resources is that you get a lot of practice with them, so it soon becomes memorization!

Answer 2

Both APA and MLA cite sources within a paper by using parenthetical, in-text references. MLA uses the author's last name and the page number as reference. APA uses the author's last name and the year of publication. If a direct quote is used, APA requires author's name, year, and page number.